Absolution
by the ersatz diplomat
Summary: "The way my mind works must be less stream-of-consciousness and more vicious cycle-of-contrition. Vicious, I tell you. My hand to god, it has fangs and tentacles." Slightly AU, set after Summer Knight.


_The Dresden Files/Codex Alera is copyright Jim Butcher. This story is licensed under the Creative Commons as derivative, noncommercial fiction._

Crossposted at the multi-fandom Day_by_Drabble community on Livejournal for the April Showers Drabblethon.

**Prompt: #19**  
><em>Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud:<br>Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,  
>And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.<br>All men make faults...  
>(William Shakespeare, Sonnet XXXV, lines 2-5)<em>

**A/N:** Somewhat AU and weird, blame the plot bunnies. I was attacked. Had to have rabies shots. There was an Awareness FunRun for the Cure and everything.

Features a cameo from a favorite Harry Potter character but is not necessarily a crossover. Just a...momentary intersection.

* * *

><p><em>Be no more grieved at that which thou hast done...<em>

This bar sucks. It's loud, there are no steak sandwiches and these girls at a table behind me are bickering:

"He's only trying to protect you!"

"He's being utterly ridiculous."

I guess it's this _pub _that sucks, if you want to get technical about it. I'm in Edinburgh, after all. I've been here for an hour nursing a glass of some unpronounceably-named locally-produced scotch and moping to a degree I hadn't achieved since… Since a few days ago, at least.

Having to give a deposition to the White Council about the battle between the Winter and Summer Faerie Courts had been hellish, no two ways about it. But I had to do it, since I'd been the one to sort their shit out. The one who led the mortal charge against the traitorous Summer Lady, Aurora, and her cohorts at the Stone Table. The one who murdered her with an army of weaponized pixies.

But I'd left as soon as the hearing was over. Just walked out into the rain, and kept walking until I felt far enough away. No one followed me but the ghosts. Well. Not real ghosts, but you get my drift.

The vivid memory of Aurora, bleeding out while I held her down, was stuck on a loop in my head and dragging up all sorts of dead from the depths.

Elaine – my first girlfriend, who I thought I'd killed in a fiery throwdown with our whackjob mentor. Linda, a client of sorts, dead because I wasn't fast enough. Kim, a friend and sometimes student – her death was as much my fault as it was MacFinn's, and every full moon is a little reminder of her.

Anger. Failure. Negligence. My fault.

And then, inevitably, Susan. Who I worse than killed, who left me to deal with it on her own. This one hurts so much more than all the others, like someone ripped my heart out with their bare hand and showed it to me, _Temple of Doom_style.

Those memories are all blood, smoke and pain - conclusive evidence for living a life of solitude.

Which brings me to Karrin, who continually lays her life on the line when more often than not it's a line I've drawn. Even though I know she hates me, sometimes. Even when we're up against things she doesn't fully understand. Like battles between faeries, and... we're right back around to Aurora.

The way my mind works must be less stream-of-consciousness and more vicious cycle-of-contrition. Vicious, I tell you. My hand to god, it has fangs and tentacles. Which is why I'm sitting here, going through it all again, contemplating why everything I touch turns to crap, why I invariably let down every woman who gets close enough.

When all I really want to do is go home.

And then pale fingers picked up my glass – it was a girl storming past my corner of the bar. She didn't stop, didn't know I'd seen her steal my drink, and I slid down from the barstool as she walked behind me, turning to face her.

She stopped a few inches short of running into me. In a split second we'd looked each other over – she was of an average height, about my age, with choppy brown hair and a pale, pretty face. Sad, dark eyes, though, and an expression that was equal parts angry and hurt with a twist of betrayal.

I know that look, which speaks for how relationships with me usually end up going. Whatever snarky comment I'd been ready to make just...died.

"That's mine, sweetheart."

She stared up at me with silent defiance. Then she lifted the glass to her lips and knocked back the single malt contents in one gulp. I was too goddamn tired to go up against another woman scorned, so I sighed, and made an educated guess.

"Look, lady. Whatever he did to you, don't take it out on me. God knows I deserve it, but please."

And then I sat down. After a minute there was the clink of two glasses on granite. She pushed one toward my hand.

"Forgive me," she said, held up her glass, and then disappeared into the crowd.

Hell. I'll drink to that.


End file.
